A Natural Human Tendency
by Hi
Summary: Short fic. After her fight with Dracula, Buffy examines her inner darkness. Hope you enjoy!


# Continuity: Set during "Buffy vs. Dracula," the night before her visit to Giles at the end of the episode. 

# Disclaimer:I don't own Buffy (not event the twisto version on display here).Joss and his people do. 

Distribution: If you want it, please ask.Or at least credit me. I may not own Buffy, but I did write the story. 

# Help an insecure writer out: give me feedback. I'd like to know if this was any good, or if it wasn't yet ready for prime time. 

# A Natural Human Tendency 

Adam---She has trouble dealing with certain concepts. It's understandable. Aggression is a natural human tendency, though you and me come by it another way.

Buffy---We're not demons

Adam---Is that a fact?

(Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Restless)

After a good chase, the ones where I can hear the air rush by me 'cause I'm running so fast, the ones where the vamp puts up a fight before it's dust, the ones that leave me craving, those are the nights I think about her.It's not every night, but it's getting more and more common now.It wasn't always like this, but it feels so natural now it's sometimes hard for me to remember that the nightly hunts haven't been a part of my life forever.I hadn't noticed the transformation in myself until Dracula came.

Dracula:the most famous vampire in history, larger than life and living up to every cliché (he even had poor Xander eating bugs).And I killed him.I should be celebrating, or at the very least resting.

Instead I'm patrolling again.No, not patrolling: Drac was right about that.Hunting if I really want to be honest with myself.Looking for vampires, demons, anything I can kill without feeling guilty about afterwards.

When it's over, I'll roll into bed with Riley: he's always sleeping like a baby (what kind of expression is that, anyway, babies sleep terribly, always up in the middle of the night crying) and I wonder what he would think if he ever woke up while I was out. Would he worry?Would he rush out the door and stumble around Sunnydale half naked and probably get himself killed, all the while thinking only about me?Would he pace around, call Giles or my house or Willow, no matter how late it was, to see if I was there?Would he hold me so tight that my ribs would hurt from the pressure the moment I came back?

Of course he would.Good old reliable Riley.Captain America and apple pie, that's Riley.That's why I love him. 

The great thing about Riley (well one of them) is that he's big: I curl up against him, and he makes me feel warm and comfortable.He's my security blanket. I know I'm safe when I'm next to him, wrapped up in those magnificently huge arms of his, like any other normal girl sleeping with her honey.

Just a couple of nights ago, I made this truly brutal kill.I grabbed a girl vampire by the hair while she was running from me, pulled her back toward me and (still holding onto her hair) then pushed her away from me with my foot while pulling on her hair in the other direction.I was trying to decapitate her, because I'd lost my stake somehow while running her down: instead, all I did was pull her scalp off . . . it was a horrible sound, but even worse was the sound her head made when I had to pull if off, grabbing that place where the jaw hinges and pulling up.Her head opened up like a pez and I had to twist her skull around before it would finally come off of her neck. All that popping of bone and tearing of flesh.Then I watched, fascinated, as the blood on my fingers dried up and turned to dust.I loved every minute of it up 'till that moment.

I spent the rest of the night shaking, even woke Riley up.He got an extra blanket for me. While he was up it was all I could keep to do from moaning her name, because hers is the closest I can come to finding a name for what I want.

It's been like this ever since the spell.

I don't think the others were effected in the same way I was . . .they only touched a power that was beyond them, brushed against it like a stranger in a crowd.Maybe they felt a chill, and maybe that was what the dreams were really about, not the First trying to push me away from my friends, but trying to push them away from the power they aren't meant to even understand, let alone posses. 

But me?I was right in the middle of it, the eye and the wind of the storm at the same time: I pulled Adam's heart out with my bare hands, and the only thing that I felt bad about was that there wasn't any blood, just wires and radiation.He thought he was the ultimate power in the universe, and I humbled him so much there was barely even any point in killing him.I didn't kill him because he needed to die. I killed him because I could.And it felt good. 

My god, did it feel good.

This wasn't just aggression, this was something deeper, primal. Inhuman.

Is this how Faith felt, when she was kicking ass and taking names?Was she right about what it is to be a Slayer all along?Is that why I hated her, envied her, sometimes secretly wanted her so much, because she'd let the power take her and run with her, while I was too scared, to busy trying to hang onto the nice normal life she'd never had in the first place?

I had a dream where the First came back to me, except this time she was Faith as well.We fought until we were too tired to move and then we kept fighting and somewhere along the line the fighting turned into fucking.

My night vision is getting better.I need sunglasses more and more in the day.I can't sleep without running down at least one vamp.I'd fuck Riley instead (and I mean really _fuck,_ the way Faith would) but I'm afraid I'd hurt him.I'm afraid I'd enjoy hurting him.Sometimes I look and Willow and Tara, and the only thing I can think is how I'd make Willow scream if I was with her that way.I'd give Xander bruises that would last for weeks.I'd give Spike bruises that would last for months.I don't like to linger too long over what I'd like to do to Angel . . .suffice to say, chains play a featured role.I'd need them to keep him down after the change, assuming having his brains fucked out by his half-crazy ex-girlfriend is Angel's idea of perfect happiness. 

Is there that much difference between lust for the kill and just plain lust?I'm beginning to think that the answer is no.Faith was sure of it, she said as much over and over again, hoping I'd get the message.The First may be succeeding where she failed, and I can't say if that scares me or excites me, or if I can even tell the difference between fear and excitement anymore. 

Of course in those days I had Angel (at least as much as I could have Angel after Angelus reminded us both of his prior claims), so I didn't really think about that: I couldn't even make love, let alone give into lust of any kind.I should have though, Faith and I . . .why did I never see it before, what we could have done for each other.Two Slayers, imagine the possibilities.I do, more and more now.It scares me: it's not even Faith I want really, it's the power, the power of the Slayer.The power of the First.I want to let it overwhelm me again, like it did during the spell.I want every punch to feel like an orgasm, and every orgasm to feel like a punch.

Want. Take. Have. 

Destroy.

The First let me keep my friends.Is she going to swallow me whole instead? Or is this just her new tactic: if you can't beat 'em, make 'em join you?Why not, it worked on Faith.

Dracula was right, drinking his blood (that I even agreed to drink his blood, thrall or no thrall), it showed me how much I'd changed. There is darkness in me, and I can feel it growing blacker every night like some toxic cloud. It's a cancer of the soul, only this cancer is building something new in place of the Buffy it's destroying.Something not even Faith, with all her baggage and guilt, could ever hope to be.The Slayer. 

I need to tell Giles, the sooner the better.

I need to, yes.The question is, can I convince myself that I want to?Maybe. After I kill this one last vamp for the night.


End file.
